Honestly, it has been my experiece that Slackware is the best one for a newbie to start out at. Although it is not a very user-friednly interface at first, once you pass the learning curve (which is only slightly higher than most other distros on the market) you will love it.

I don't know much of anything about security on Windows Servers, I mean, I can lock out a few things and read logs, but on Slack...I am dang near a security admin! There are many useful things that you get out of that just don't come with other distros. If you are running any type of server I HIGHLY suggest Slackware. And if you get lost, you can check out http://linuxquestions.org they have a forum completely for Slack from n00bs to SysAdmins.

However, the way you have summarized this is a good description. I can't really see many of the distros of import that you overlooked so keep up the good work!

Worth noting that MEPIS, iirc, isn't entirely free! From conversations in #mepis on freenode, I seem to recall that there is a certain amount of binary-only-code in MEPIS, particularly in the installer/their configuration software. Don't quote me on this, I'm not a gospel, and this is basically hearsay..

Ubuntu, especially given how much extra ground hoary is covering, is definitely a candidate for the 'userfriendly' category. Based on debian, ubuntu is simple to update and resilient, whilst the UI is smoothly and intuitively designed, and the community philosophy is admirable, making the ubuntu community, for the most part, extremely enjoyable to be around.

Ubuntu has many of the benefits of debian, whilst at the same time giving you a i) modern, ii) secure (read: security updates from the security team, unlike debian testing/unstable), iii) easy to install system. Some of the features planned for the next version of ubuntu promise to give us even more reason to praise ubuntu.

I can add my praise for ubuntu to njans also. I have used it from the outset and its is a very nice, user friendly distro. One that in my opinion rivals Mandrake, Suse and Fedora possibly the major three distros of last year.

Hoary is a great improvement and again makes it very easy for user to stay secure with automatic updates. Installing software from system repositories has never been easier in my opinion also.

I've used Redhat for the past 7 years but recently switched to Gentoo. There is no way I'd go back. For those worried about the complexity, the latest version is available with a graphical installer.

The documentation is out of this world. Not only does it give you line by line instructions on how to install and manage the system, it explains why. Even without using the graphical install, anyone with mid-level computer skills can do this.

As for the compile time, I've installed it on 2 PII 450 machines and a dual P3 700. The initial install takes the good part of a day on a slow machine but you don't have to be at your terminal for 70% of that time. The key to minimizing the install time is to only install the packages you want to use. Don't install everything. You can always install a package later if you end up needing it. Once you're install is complete, the on-going update process is very straight forward and fast. You don't have to worry about all the inherit issues with binary based distributions especially the dreaded package compatibility problems.

someone recomended Ubuntu to me. What are the pros an cons of this distro?

To be honest as a long term mandrake user i cant see any cons of this distro, its the best i have used in 10 years, reasons being that its easy to configure and install apps, its secure, it has well populated software repositories, it hasnt crashed on me yet .. it works on my hardware with minimal configuration .... easy method of software updates.. it looks and feels nice (dapper drake)

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